Sin isn't only about individual actions or behaviors, but the collective and systemic acts -- and failures to act -- that we all participate in. Prophets like Micah understood sin as the way that the people and their leaders were failing to follow God's commandment to love our neighbors, especially our neighbors who have been made the most vulnerable by political, economic, and social forces. Liberal Christians, or Progressive Christians are usually uncomfortable with the word "sin" because of the way it's been used in Christian communities to demonize people and exclude people. But we can reclaim this prophetic practice of identifying sin as the ways that we and our political leaders are harming those among us who need our solidarity. We can follow the lead of the prophets who demand that we take care of each other and our world, using our collective and shared resources wisely and sustainably. As we're learning in our Lenten Study about climate justice, it's important that we don't turn away from the sins that are taking place in our world, so that we can act with courage to do God's justice.
Copyright/Attributions: Scripture reading: Micah 3:1-8 quotations are from New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Photo: "Greta Thunberg, Paris (France), 22 février 2019"' by stephane_p, shared under Creative Commons license CC BY-ND-NC 2.0